12

A man’s hand reaches down into a shaft and he pulls a girl up, a blonde. She moves closer to him and together they walk toward a chopper. His arm is around her and she wiggles her hips as she walks. In the chopper they drink champagne. Her giggling becomes louder, more frequent.

They touch down at a large house and the girl runs forward. She’s running on gravel, and on the way to the front door she passes an ornate fountain. Inside the house she flings her arms around him and pushes her lips against his. A lustful kiss, which ends only after they spin around several times and wind up against the wall. She rips his shirt off and runs her fingers along his muscled chest. She kisses his nipples. He hikes up her skirt and she undoes his button-fly jeans. She wiggles herself on top of him and he pushes her further up against the wall.

Several minutes later they unlink. He grabs her hand and leads her upstairs to a bedroom. She jumps straight on the four-poster and immediately sees the handcuffs. She lies down, rolls onto her stomach and puts on the first handcuff. He kneels on the bed to secure the other one. She pulls her leg into her chest and then extends it so her shin is touching her handcuffed arm, in a display of her flexibility.

He runs his hands down her leg and to her crotch but soon brings her leg back down to the bed, where he cuffs it. He clamps the final handcuff over her ankle and then stands up and moves away.

He tears her clothes off and moves himself on top of her. But this time there’s only fear in her eyes.

She is dead, a heart drawn on her chest.

I wake up, disorientated. A man hovers in the darkness beside my bed. I scream and reach for my gun, my hands closing around my weapon. I swing it toward the shape.

“Sophie, it’s me!”

My eyes focus and I realize Darren is standing beside my bed. That’s right, I’m in Darren’s spare bedroom.

I lower my gun. “What happened?”

“You were screaming. I knocked, but…sorry, I didn’t know what else to do so I came in, hoping I could wake you.”

My pounding heart isn’t showing any signs of slowing down. I put my gun back on the bedside table and swing my legs out of the bed so I’m sitting on the edge.

“Another dream?” Darren asks tentatively.

“Yes.”

“What did you see?”

“Another body. A woman, but not the brunette. She had the love heart on her chest.” I pause. “There was more, but I can’t remember it.” I guess I’ve repressed it already. One thing’s for sure, death is not pretty.

“Another woman?”

“I know, it doesn’t make sense.” I stand up and start pacing. “Okay, so Malcolm was killed by this woman who’s been screwing men and killing them for fifteen years. But is the brunette related? And this new woman…she had the love heart.”

Darren remains silent, realizing I need to vent.

“Why has our female killer suddenly changed her MO and introduced this new signature, the love heart?” I collapse back onto the bed. “Why can’t I figure this out?”

“Sophie, it’s confusing. Confusing as hell.” Darren sits down next to me. “I mean, if the rose tattoo wasn’t there, we wouldn’t have linked Malcolm’s death to the other ones at all.”

“The other question mark. Why go from leaving the black rose out on display to hiding it as a small tattoo on the victim? It’s like she was hoping we wouldn’t notice it.”

“Maybe that was the plan exactly.”

I run with Darren’s train of thought. “She’s worried about getting caught so she stages it to look like a different killer. Yet her compulsive nature means she has to leave the rose somewhere at the crime scene.”

“That’s what I’m thinking.”

I let it sink in. “It’s the only explanation that makes sense.”

Darren nods. “Unless someone knew about the rose and is setting our girl up.” From the other room Darren’s cell phone rings. We both instinctively glance at our watches—it’s 3:00 a.m. A phone call at 3:00 a.m. can only mean one thing: a dead body. We look at each other briefly in silent acknowledgement of this fact before Darren bolts into his bedroom to pick up the phone.

I pull my jeans on, whip off my pajama top and slip into a sweater. There’s no doubt in my mind we’re going out to a crime scene.

Darren comes back into my room, in jeans and pulling on a sweater. He only appears moderately surprised to find me fully dressed.

“Well?”

“A blonde. U of A again.”

It’s all too familiar. The body of a young woman lies naked, wedged into a dark corner. This time the vic has been left next to a Dumpster on the University of Arizona campus. Temporary floodlights illuminate the crime scene as police, forensic investigators and a representative from the ME’s office comb the area.

“Is it her?” Darren whispers as soon as we’re close enough to see the woman’s face.

I don’t speak, I simply nod.

“Hi, Carter.” It’s not the ME at the scene this time, it’s his assistant.

“Morning, Johnson.”

I keep my eyes on the woman. She’s about five-seven, perfectly toned with long, long legs. Her blonde hair is shortish, to her earlobes, and has a gentle wave. Her eyes are open and glassy—there’s no mistaking she’s dead.

“What have we got?” Darren asks, getting down to business.

“Looks like manual strangulation as the cause of death.” Johnson points to some bruising on her neck, which is quite obvious. This girl is not only Caucasian, but very, very fair, making it much easier to see the strangulation marks than it was on Malcolm. “I’d say she’s been dead for less than twenty-four hours. And then of course there’s that.” He gestures to the marking that partially covers the woman’s breasts. The love heart.

“Anything on the inside of her wrists?” I ask.

Johnson looks at me. “You’re the FBI agent?”

“Yes, that’s right. Agent Anderson.” I put my hand out, suddenly reminded of the formalities. I saw Johnson when Malcolm was discovered but we weren’t introduced.

He shakes my hand. “Johnson. No tattoo of a rose, if that’s what you’re looking for.”

“And it’s not anywhere else on her body?”

“Not that I can see. Not yet, at least.”

I notice Stone making her way through the perimeter. She looks like I feel—wrecked. Her auburn hair is sticking out at odd angles and beneath her jacket I notice her shirt is half tucked in.

“Bed hair, Stone?” Darren gives her a boyish grin.

She rakes her fingers through her hair, then gives Darren a lighthearted glare. She looks down at the body. “Another one.”

“Might not be related,” I say.

Stone points to the love heart. “Not related?”

“No tattoo. No rose. Female victim.” Now I’m playing devil’s advocate, going against both my instincts and visions, which are telling me that the deaths are connected, somehow.

Stone gives us a thoughtful nod. “Maybe Malcolm wasn’t killed by the motel woman.”

She’s got a good point and it’s exactly what Darren was alluding to before we got the call. It’s possible our killer somehow knew about the rose and wanted to throw us a curveball.

Darren bends down next to Johnson. “Who’s our first responder?”

“O’Grady.” Johnson motions to one of the cops who’s at the perimeter.

Darren, Stone and I move toward O’Grady. It only takes us a few minutes to learn that the body was found by a student from the Yavapai Residence Hall around the corner. He couldn’t sleep because his French roomie had thrown a slab of ten-day-old blue cheese in the bin, stinking up the whole room. Our plain-food-loving guy had stormed out, trash in hand, just before 3:00 a. m., only to discover he had more things to worry about than the stench of smelly cheese.